Snowboy

by KITT.AI (defunct) · community

Legacy customizable wake-word engine — community-maintained after KITT.AI shutdown.

TL;DR

Legacy customizable wake-word engine — community-maintained after KITT.AI shutdown.

Best for reference / legacy support — older Mycroft-class projects relied on Snowboy. Pricing: free.

Category
Open source
License
—
Stars
—
Last push
—
Pricing
free
Platforms
Linux, macOS, Hardware

What it is

Snowboy was the dominant wake-word engine in the 2016–2020 maker era. Now community-maintained only; new projects should pick openWakeWord (free) or Picovoice Porcupine (commercial-friendly).

Best for: Reference / legacy support — older Mycroft-class projects relied on Snowboy.
Watch out for: KITT.AI shut down in 2020; official model-training service is gone; modern projects prefer openWakeWord or Porcupine.

Install / use

github.com/Kitt-AI/snowboy — community fork required for new builds

Features

Speaker diarizationNo
Word-level timestampsNo
Streaming / real-timeYes
Languages supported1
HIPAA eligibleNo

Snowboy vs Whipscribe

FeatureSnowboyWhipscribe
CategoryOpen sourceTranscription APIs
Pricingfreefree beta
Speaker diarization—Yes
Word timestamps—Yes
StreamingYesNo
Languages199
PlatformsLinux, macOS, HardwareWeb, API, MCP

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Whipscribe is a managed faster-whisper + whisperX service. If you want transcripts without running infrastructure, paste a URL or drop a file in the form below — you'll have a transcript in seconds.